JC 


IRLF 


W9 


SB    2S    411 


JUSTICE. 


A  DISCOURSE    TO    THE   STUDENTS   OF    THE 


LAW   DEPARTMENT 


OF    THE 


INDIANA    UNIVEBSITY, 


DELIVERED    AT    THEIR  ^REQUEST,    ON 


Conferring  upon  ifye  ®>rabttating  OTla0s  tljeir  ^Diplomas, 


FEBRUARY  26,   1850. 


BY    ANDREW    WYLIE,   Z>.   D 

PRESIDENT    OF    THE   UNIVERSITY. 


BLOOMINGTON: 

PRINTED    AT   THE    INDIANA   TRIBUNE   OFFICE. 
1850. 


JUSTICE. 


A   DISCOURSE    TO    THE   STUDENTS    OF   THE 


LAW   DEPARTMENT 


OF    THE 


INDIANA    UNIVERSITY, 

DELIVERED    AT    THEIR    REQUEST,    ON 

C0nfming  njwn  tf)e  (Srabttaiing  Class  tfyeir  Diplomas, 
FEBRUARY   26,    1850. 


BIT    ANDREW    WYLIE,    B.   D. 

PRESIDENT    OF    THE^  UNIVERSITY. 


BLOOMINGTON: 

PRINTED    AT   THE    INDIANA    TRIBUNE   OFFICE. 
1850. 


c 


UNIVERSITY  OF  INDIANA,  February  27th,  1850. 
DEAR  SIR: — On  behalf  of  our  fellow  students   we  would  respectfully 
solicit,  for  publication,  a  copy  of  your, Discourse  delivered  before  the  Law 
Department,  on  the  26th  instant,  and  would  tender  an  acknowledgment 
of  the  obligation  which  you'confefred  upon  us  in  accepting  the  invitation 
to  address  us  on  the  occasion  of  our  Commencement. 
With  feelings  of  the  highest  regard, 

Your  obedient  servants, 

W.  S.  HILLYER,      ) 
S.  K.' WOLFE,  >  Committe. 

ROBT.  H.  MILROY,! 
Rev.  ANDREW  WYLIE,  D.  D. 


UNIVERSITY  opf  INDIANA,  February  27th,  1850. 

GENTLEMEN: — The  kind  feelings,  on  your  part,  which  have  construed 
my  consent  to  deliver  to  you  a  Discourse  at  the  close  of  the  past  term  into 
an  "obligation  conferred"  upon  you,  are  appreciated  and  reciprocated  on 
mine.  The  copy  which  you  ask  is  at  your  disposal.  Please  accept  for 
yourselves,  and  for  the  other  students  whom  you  represent,  assurances  of 
that  high  regard,  with  which  I  am,  gentlemen, 

Your  most  obedient  humble  servant, 

ANDREW  WYLIE. 
Messrs.  W.  S.  HILLYER,   } 

S.  K.  WOLFE,        >  Committee. 
ROBT.  H.  MILROY,) 


DISCOURSE. 


YOUNG  GENTLEMEN  : 

The  University  is  about  to  reward  your  diligence  in  the  study 
of  law,  by  conferring  upon  each  of  you  a  Diploma,  certifying 
your  attainments  in  legal  science  to  be  such  as  to  qualify  you 
for  the  practice  of  the  law,  the  profession  of  which  you  have 
in  view. 

I  could  think  of  no  subject  more  proper  for  the  occasion  than 
that  of  justice;  for  this  is  the  end  at  which  the  law  aims,  and  for 
the  attainment  of  which  courts  of  law  and  the  legal  profession 
have  been  provided  as  instruments.     But  I  do  not  propose,  in 
the  following  remarks,  to  discuss  the  subject  of  justice,  but  only 
to  explain  it.     And,  in  attempting  to  do  this,  I  do  not  expect  to 
offer  any  thing  which  will  be  new  to  you,  any  thing  which  you 
have  not  already  heard  from  the  lips  of  the  honorable  Professors 
on  whose  instructions  it  has  been  your  privilege  to  attend.     But 
as  it  is  not  their  province  to  treat  of  justice  directly,  the  refer- 
ences to  it  which  they  may  have  made  in  the  course  of  their 
lectures,  it  might  not  be  useless  to  you,  not  only  as  lawyers,  but 
as  men  and  citizens,  to   have   placed  under  your  eye  in  some- 
thing like  a  tabellary  view,  in  language  less  technical  than  we 
naturally  look  for  when  subjects  are  discussed  at   large  and 
drawn  out  into  a  system.      To  furnish  such  a  representation  of 
the  body  of  justice  itself  as  the  references  of  law,  like  so  many 
lines,  verge  towards  and  terminate  in,  is  what  I  have  had  prin- 
cipally in  view  in  the  following  remarks.     Let  it,  however-,  be 
here  understood,  once  for  all,  that  justice  reigns  in  a  much  wider 
and  higher  sphere  than  the  authority  pf  human  laws.     The 
exactness  of  her  precepts,  human  laws  may  approximate,  but 
they  can  never  reach, 

M189474 


And  if.  in  what  I  am  about  to  say  in  reference  to  this  matter, 
an  idea  should  occur,  here  or  there,  which  belongs  properly  to 
the  province  of  law,  and  which  the  honorable  Professors  of  the 
law  have  already  communicated  to  you  in  an  abler  and  better 
manner,  they  will  not,  I  trust,  charge  me  with  having  invaded 
their  province  with  any  felonious  intent,  but  will  have  the  good- 
ness to  consider  that  ideas,  like  sheep,  have  naturally  a  strong 
propensity  to  ramble,  and  that,  as  the  field  of  morals  which  it 
is  my  official  duty  to  cultivate,  lies  contiguous  to  that  on  which 
their  labors  are  bestowed,  it  ought  not  to  seem  strange  if,  on 
this  occasion,  some  ideas  from  their  side  of  the  dividing  line 
should  be  found  on  my  side  of  it.  I  find,  in  the  Revised  Statutes, 
chap.  53,  sec.  22,  it  has  been  thus  enacted  that,  "every  person 
who  shall  alter  the  mark  or  brand  of  horse,  mare  or  gelding, 
mule,  ass,  sheep,  goat,  neat  cattle,  or  hog,  of  another,  or  mark 
and  brand  the  same  with  intent  to  steal  such  horse,  mare,  geld- 
ing, mule,  ass,  sheep,  goat,  neat  cattle,  or  hog,  shall,  if  the  value 
of  the  animal  or  animals  so  marked  be  five  Collars  or  upwards, 
be  subjected  to  the  punishment  inflicted  on  those  guilty  of  GRAND 
larceny."  As  this  discourse  proceeds,  its  author  is  somewhat 
uneasy  for  fear  of  the  penalty  attached  to  this  statute.  No 
animal  exhibited  in  it,  can,  he  thinks,  be  valued  at  less  than  five 
dollars.  His  only  hope  of  escape  is  founded  on  the  plea,  that 
the  mark  or  brand  has  in  no  case  been  altered,  but  only  a  label 
attached  shewing  of  what  sort  the  creature  is,  So  that  if  the 
label  should  not  please,  it  may  be  detached,  and  let  the  thing  run. 

What,  then,  is  justice?  The  word  has  several  meanings;  and 
what  is  true  of  it  in  one  of  these  meanings  may  not  be  true  of 
it  in  another.  As,  if  I  were  speaking  of  a  file^  a  carpenter 
would  think  of  the  instrument  which  he  uses  in  sharpening  his 
saw;  the  military  captain  would  think  of  a  number  of  soldiers 
stationed  in  a  line;  while  to  the  lawyer  the  word  would  suggest 
the  idea  of  some  papers  placed  away  in  an  orderly  manner;  and 
to  the  judge,  that  of  a  series  of  judicial  decisions  made  according 
to  some  one  principle.  Every  one  sees  that  what  would  be  true 
of  a  file  in  any  one  of  these  four  senses,  could  hardly  fail  to  be 
false  in  all  the  remaining  three.  Not  one  in  ten  of  those  who 


pronounce  the  word  door,  several  times  almost  every  day  of 
their  lives,  is  aware  that,  besides  its  numerous  metaphorical 
meanings,  it  signifies  literally  two  things,  which  resemble  each 
other  in  no  respect  but  one.  The  opening  in  the  wall  and  the 
shutter  which  closes  it,  are,  in  truth,  very  unlike  in  every  thing, 
but  a  similarity  of  dimensions. 

The  first  distinction  we  have  to  point  out  in  the  things  which 
the  word  justice  denotes,  is  that  of  objective  and  subjective. 
The  objective  is  that  which  the  mind  contemplates;  the  subject- 
ive is  a  virtue  existing  in  the  mind  itself.  The  objective  and  the 
subjective,  in  Greek,  which  is  the  most  beautiful  and  flexible  <•!* 
languages,  are  denoted  by  two  different  names,  but  cognate. 
Dike  is  objective  justice,  to  which  our  word  right,  in  one  of  \\-- 
many  senses,  corresponds.  Dikaiosune  is  subjective  justice,  to 
which  our  word  righteousness  corresponds.  But  here,  unfor- 
tunately, our  stock  of  paronymous  words,  derived  from  right, 
runs  out,  while  in  Greek  the  root  Dike  is  found  in  Judge,  (Dikas- 
tes;)  in  To  Judge,  (Dikadzo;)  in  Tribunal,  (Dikasterion;)  and 
many  more. 

For  the  sake  of  fixing  in  the  mind  this  very  important  distinc- 
tion between  the  objective  and  the  subjective,  think  of  the  word 
sight,  as  it  occurs  in  the  following  sentence  :  A  hunter,  coming 
suddenly  upon  a  herd  of  deer — a  gratifying  sight — taking  sight 
at  one  of  them,  fired;  and  the  powder  happening  to  flash  into 
one  of  his  eyes,  injured  it  so  that,  for  a  while  he  thought  he 
should  lose  the  sight  of  it  altogether.  Here  it  will  be  perceived 
that  the  word  occurs  three  different  times ;  and  in  each  has  a 
different  meaning.  In  the  first  place,  it  is  objective  ;  in  the  sec- 
ond and  third  it  is  subjective,,  with  this  difference,  that,  in  the 
third,  it  denotes  the  power  of  sight,  and  in  the  second,  an  exer- 
tion of  that  power. 

The  definition  of  justice,  so  often  quoted  from  Justinian,  is  a 
definition  of  subjective  justice.  "Constans  et  perpetua  voluntas 
suumcuique  tribuendi,"  (a  firm  and  invariable  determination 
to  give  to  every  one  his  own,)  tells  us  what  the  the  virtue  called 
justice  is.  But  it  is  a  definition  which  gives  us  no  valuable  infor- 
mation as  to  what  justice  itself  \^  Jt  is  "suum,"  one's  own. 


6 

But  what  is  that  which  makes  any  thing  mine,  or  yours,  or  any 
one's?  Were  the  definition  unexceptionable,  the  answer  to  this 
question  would  be  the  same  as  the  answer  to  the  question,  what 
is  justice?  But  it  is  manifest  that  the  same  answer  will  not  suit 
in  both  cases.  The  truth  is,  that  justice  gives  no  man  a  claim 
to  any  thing  but  one,  against  God,*  and  to  but  very  few  things 
as  against  his  fellow-men—much  fewer  certainly  than  is  gener- 
ally imagined. 

To  begin  then,  as  is  natural,  with  objective  justice,  and  with 
that  species  of  it  which  is  called  commutative  :  this,  as  the  word 
commutative  intimates,  takes  place  in  the  case  when,  in  the  in 
tercourse  of  human  transactions,  an  exchange  of  values  is  made 
on  terms  of  perfect  reciprocity ;  so  that  what  is  given  is  exactly 
equal  to  wrhat  is  received.      All  values  of  things  exchangable 
may  be  reduced  to  labor  as  the  effective  element.     Let  us  con- 
sider labor  as  measured  by  time;  and  let  the  equation  be,  a  day's 
work  for  a  day's  work.     There  are  thousands  of  cases  in  which 
men  are  benefitted  alike  by  such  an  exchange.     Two  men  can 
do  much  more,  of  some  kinds  of  work,  in  one  day,  by  uniting 
their  efforts,  than  either  of  them  could  do,  by  himself,  in  two 
days :  as,  for  instance,  in  sawing  timber  with  a  cross-cut  saw, 
piling  logs,  or  the  like.      And  there  are  some  kinds  of  work 
which  require  the  joint  efforts  of  many  men.      I  will  help  you 
to  saw  logs  to-day,  if  you  will  help  me  to-morrow.     It  is  a  fair 
bargain.     But  if,  after  fulfilling  my  part  of  it,  you  refuse  to  ful- 
fill yours,  you  have  received  the  value  of  a  day's  la^bor  for  which 
you  have  given  nothing  at  all  in  exchange,     This  is  a  violation 
of  commutative  justice.      But  there  is,  in  the  case,  an  act  of 
injustice  of  quite  a  different  kind,  which  will  be  noticed  in  its 
proper  connexion.     But  if  you  should  put  off  the  performance 
of  your  part  of  the  bargain,  till  the  days  become  shorter  by  an 
hour,  then  you  have,  besides  the  injustice  of  the  delay,  cheated 
me  out  of  an  hour's  work.      Or,  if,  in  performing  your  day's 
work,  you  do  it  lazily,  or  carelessly,  watching  the  sun  more  than 

*  On  the  supposition  that  man  were  innocent,  he  would  have  a  claim  on  his 
Maker  that  his  existence  should  be  such  as  not  to  be  worse  than  non-existence. 
This  js  all  the  right  which  an  innocent  creature  can  claim  of  the  justice  of  its 
Maker.  Whatever  more  than  this  falls  to  its  lot,  is  a  gratuity  originating  not 
in  justice  but  goodnoss. 


the  business  that  you  seem  to  be  engaged  in,  or  putting  into 
your  strokes  nothing  of  that  hearty  good  will  and  vigor  of  effort 
which  a  man  exerts  who  wishes  to  do  the  best  he  can,  you  have 
returned  less  than  you  received,  and,  to  that  amount,  you  have 
been  guilty  of  injustice. 

The  four  cases  of  contracts  distinguished  under  the  formulas, 
"do  ut  des,  do  ut  facias,  facio  ut  des,  facio  ut  facias,"  may  all  be 
reduced  to  this  simple  principle  of  work  for  work.  For,  when 
you  give  a  dollar  for  a  day's  work,  you  yourself  must  have 
worked  a  day  for  that  dollar — on  the  supposition  that  your  work 
is  equal  in  value  to  that  which  you  obtain  for  it.  Or,  if  you 
work  a  day  and  get  a  dollar  for  it,  the  dollar  is  the  same  as  a, 
day's  work  ;  since,  on  the  same  supposition,  the  man  for  whom 
you  worked  did  a  day's  work  to  procure  the  dollar.  Or,  if  you 
go  to  the  store  and  buy  with  the  dollar  ten  pounds  of  coffee,  the 
coffee  must  have  cost  a  day's  labor,  expended  by  different  hands 
in  its  production  and  conveyance  from  the  place  where  it  grew 
to  the  store  where  you  bought  it.  The  fragments  of  time  spent  in 
furnishing  the  commodity  to  your  hand,  taken  together,  amount 
to  just  one  day.  If  more  time  had  been  spent  in  producing  the 
ten  pounds  of  coffee,  you  would  have  had  to  pay  more;  and  if 
less,  less.  Whatever  arts  in  business  are  resorted  to  for  the  pur- 
pose of  turning  the  scale  from  its  equipoise  either  way,  a/e 
dishonest  and  in  violation  of  commutative  justice. 

To  simplify  the  problem,  I  have  supposed  labor  in  all/cases 
to  be  equal  in  quality.  But  this  is  not  the  case.  A  Mwyer  is 
paid  more  for  services  rendered  in  one  hour,  than  <he  day  la- 
borer earns  in  a  month.  Other  cases  might  be  mentioned,  in 
which  the  inequality  is  still  greater:  this  arises  from  a  difference 
in  the  quality  of  labor.  Another  element  in  the  problem  must 
also  be  considered :  capital. 

He  who  works  with  the  aid  of  capital,  has  a  great  advantage 
over  one  who  works  without  it.  His  gains  go  on  increasing  as 
his  capital  increases.  This  is  so  well  understood  that  in  needs 
no  illustration. 

Is  the  difference  in  these  two  cases  just  ?  It  is  of  no  use  to 
conceal  what  facts  declare  on  this  subject,  and  that  is  this,  that, 


8 

in  the  opinion  of  that  class  who  have  not  the  aid  of  capital,  and 
who  cannot  perform  any  but  the  lowest  kinds  of  labor — lowest, 
because  they  require  the  least  skill — the  difference  is  not  just. 
And  as  the  difference  is  against  them,  they  are  not  satisfied  with 
the  present  state  of  things,  but  are  looking  for  some  change 
which  will  put  them  on  a  level  with  the  highest.  And  there  are 
not  wanting  those  who,  for  their  own  ambitious  ends,  are  ever 
ministering  to  the  delusion  of  these  simple  people. 

This  is  not  the  place  nor  the  time  for  shewing  that  the  notions 
l»y  which  they  are  captivated,  are  really  a  delusion;  yet,  if  one 
of  this  class  were  to  come  up  here,  and  frankly  answer  me  a 
few  simple  questions,  after  the  Socratic  method,  it  appears  to  me 
he  would  soon  be  convinced  of  his  error,  or  at  least  silenced. 

"Do  you  do  a  day's  work  for  the  same  wages,"  I  would  ask 
him,  "when  you  eat  at  your  own  table,  and  when  at  his  for 
•whom  you  work?"  "I  have  a  third  more  in  the  first  case,"  he 
would  say.  "Why  a  third  more  ?"  I  would  ask.  "For  my 
boarding,"  he  would  reply.  "Well,  my  good  fellow,"  I  would 
say,  "your  boarding,  that  is  to  say,  the  eatables  you  have  laid 
up,  are  your  capital,  or  a  part  of  it,  and  here,  you  see  that,  by 
means  of  it,  you  earn  more,  by  one  third,  than  without  it  you 
could.  And,  since  these  eatables  cost  labor,  it  is  biit  just  that 
you,  who  bought  them  by  your  labor,  should  have  the  benefit 
of  it:  is  it  not  just?"  "Certainly,"  he  would  reply.  "Your 
ansv?er  is  right,"  I  would  say,  "and  it  is  right  on  a  principle 
which  -vill  apply  with  equal  force  to  all  cases  in  which  the  pro- 
ductive power  of  capital,  by  union  with  labor,  increases  the 
effectiveness  of  the  labor." 

As  to  the  difference  which  arises  from  the  difference  of  one 
kind  of  labor  compared  with  another  in  regard  to  quality,  the 
rule,  that  the  higher  quality  should  command  the  higher  price, 
may  be  proved  to  be  just,  upon  the  the  principle  that  a  greater 
amount  of  labor  is  always  concentrated  for  the  production  of 
the  higher  quality.  The  lawyer's  work  before  referred  to,  for 
example,  is  not  only  that  which  he  employs  through  the  voice, 
pen,  ink  and  paper,  as  the  instruments,  but  that  also  whicji  he 
performed  through  a  series  of  many  days,  and  even  yea/s,  in 


acquiring  the  skill  necessary  to  enable  him  to  do  justice  to  the 
cause  of  his  client.  His  skill  is,  in  fact,  his  capital.  And  if 
there  be  any  skill  of  any  useful  sort  which  comes  to  man  in 
some  preternatural  way,  and  not  by  labor,  bodily  or  mental, 
with  regard  to  such  the  maxim  holds,  which  was  applied  in  the 
case  of  the  Apostles  in  reference  to  the  exercise  of  their  mirac- 
ulous gifts,  "freely  ye  have  received,  freely  give."  The  modern 
boaster,  who  claims  to  be  heard,  in  the  exercise  of  a  vocation 
for  which  he  has  been  prepared,  without  learning  philosophy, 
or  any  thing  which  implies  labor  on  his  part,  is  unjust,  when 
he  receives  any  thing  by  way  of  compensation  for  the  exercise 
of  his  talent.  For  compensation  supposes  two  things,  one 
weighed  against  the  other  in  the  even  scales  of  a  just  balance. 
But  here  there  is  nothing  to  be  compensated. 

The  time  allows  me  to  pursue  this  part  of  my  subject  no  fur- 
ther. One  very  general  remark,  however,  seems  necessary  to 
prevent  a  misunderstanding  of  what  has  been  said.  The  re- 
mark is  this,  that  commutative  justice  can  never  be  secured  by 
the  strictest  adherence  to  any  code  of  laws  which  human  wis- 
dom can  devise.  The  complexity  of  law  serves  often  no  better 
purpose  than  to  form  a  nest,  in  which  the  serpent  of  injustice 
may  hide  itself  the  more  securely.  Hence  the  maxim,  "The 
rigor  of  law  is  the  height  of  injustice;"  "Summum  jus  summa 
injuria." 

The  Schoolmen  had  a  saying,  that  "of  contraries  the  knowl- 
edge is  the  same."  But  the  task  here  would  be  endless.  In 
the  fluctuation  and  uncertainty  of  human  affairs,  injustice  is 
ever  assuming  new  forms.  The  forms  that  are  possible,  are 
innumerable.  The  history  of  the  world  is  made  up  of  them, 
and  yet  one  part  in  a  million  has  not  been  recorded.  One  of 
these  unrecorded  instances  I  shall  here  mention  by  way  of  spec- 
imen. A  rich  landlord,  no  matter  where,  rented  to  a  poor  man 
a  poor  farm.  His  tenant  was  bound  by  contract  to  pay  for  the 
rent  so  many  bushels  of  grain.  The  season  was  unpropitious, 
and  the  utmost  care  and  labor  of  the  tenant,  expended  on  the 
over-worked  and  ungrateful  soil,  failed  to  raise  from  it  the  stipu- 
lated number  of  bushels  ;  so  that  he  was  compelled  to  buy  grain 


10 

to  pay  his  rent.  Was  this  just?  It  was  according  to  law. 
And  there  is  no  principle  in  jurisprudence  more  sacred  than  that 
which  maintains  the  inviolability  of  contracts; 

Hence,  if  we  speak  of  subjective  justice,  justice  as  a  living 
virtue,  justice  in  the  heart  and  character  of  a  man,  we  must 
suppose  him  to  recognize*  with  pious  faith  and  reverence,  that 
higher  and  purer  law,  of  which  Hooker  pronounced  the  well 
known  eulogium,  "Her  seat  is  the  bosom  of  God;  her  voice,  the 
harmony  of  the  universe.  None  so  high  as  to  be  above  her 
control :  none  so  low  as  to  be  beneath  her  care." 

The  next  species  of  justice  which  I  shall  notice,  is  in  its  nature 
different,  essentially  different,  in  my  humble  judgment,  from 
commutative  justice — under  which,  however,  it  is  sometimes 
ranked.  And  this  error  in  classification  has,  if  I  am  not  mista- 
ken, furnished  many  an  occasion  for  criminal  conduct.  The 
justice  to  which  I  now  refer,  is,  at  some  one  point  or  other, 
always  felt  as  a  ligature,  which,  as  men  try  to  break  it,  galls 
arid  frets  them  the  more.  They  hate  it,  therefore;  and,  when- 
ever they  can  unite  in  sufficient  numbers  to  effect  their  purpose, 
they  never  fail  to  break  its  bands  assunder  and  cast  its  cords 
away  from  them.  I  speak  of  the  unprincipled.  A  just  man 
loves  justice.  He  is  not  galled  by  it,  for  it  fits  him.  "He  puts 
on  righteousness  and  it  clothes  him  :  his  judgment  is  as  a  robe 
and  diadem." 

The  end  of  that  justice  of  which  I  am  now  speaking,  is  to 
restrict  men  in  their  liberty. 

If,  in  the  phrase,  "suum  cuique" — what  is  every  one's  own — is 
to  be  included  the  right  to  use  it  as  every  one  pleases — if  a  man 
may  do  what  he  will  with  his  own — then  I  maintain  that  no 
man  has  any  thing  at  all  of  that  sort.  No  man  has  any  such 
rights,  as  against  God,  to  any  part  of  his  own  individual  self; 
and  no  man  has  any  such  right,  unless  under  due  restrictions 
and  limitations,  as  against  his  fellow  man.  The  liberty  which 
we  prize  so  dearly,  is  not  the  liberty  to  do  what  we  please  with 
our  own.  Such  liberty  is  not  for  man.  With  reverence  I  speak 
it — it  is  not  for  God.  The  Eternal  God  whom  we  adore,  is 
bound  and  restricted  in  the  exercise  of  his  omnipotence  by  the 


11 

holy  bands  of  impartial  justice.  The  liberty  which  belongs  to 
Him  as  the  sovereign  of  the  universe,  respects  the  exercise  of 
beneficence,  not  justice. 

A  man  owns  his  limbs.  That  machine — made  up  of  a  com- 
plication of  levers,  which  we  call  bones ;  hinges,  which  we  call 
joints;  pullies,  which  we  call  muscles — and  so  forth — that  ma- 
chine which  the  Creator  has  formed  and  put  into  the  hands  of 
the  soul — to  be  moved  by  it— and  by  moving  which  the  soul  can 
move  other  things  in  the  surrounding  world  of  matter ;  but  not 
otherwise — that  machine,  a  certain  soul,  burning  with  the  "auri 
sacra  fames,"  the  accursed  love  of  gold,  puts  in  motion — in  the 
darkness  of  night — and,  with  it  firmly  grasping,  in  that  part  of 
it  called  the  hand,  an  instrument  of  steel,  commits  murder — kills 
the  sleeping  owner  of  the  gold — that  being,  in  this  soul's  way  of 
thinking,  the  shortest  way  to  get  at  the  possession  of  the  gold  ! 

The  slanderer  moves  his  tongue — this  being  a  part  of  him- 
self— or  his  fingers,  with  a  pen  in  them,  or  a  printing  press,  with 
the  view  of  assailing  reputation  in  the  use  of  detraction,  calum- 
ny and  lies — prompted  by  envy.  Seduction  embraces  in  its 
serpent  folds  the  victim  which  it  means  to  devour. 

The  spirit  of  error  corrupts  the  moral  sentiments  of  the  com- 
munity, that  it  may  exercise  a  despotic  rule  over  those  whom 
it  seeks  to  beguile  ;  and  thus  commits  an  injury,  which  goes  like 
a  virulent  poison  to  the  seat  of  that  which  may  be  truly  called 
the  life  of  life,  infecting  the  spiritual  part  in  man's  nature. 

Besides  all  those  exhorbitant  passions,  which  prompt  men  to 
transgress  the  bounds  of  justice,  there  is  what  we  may  call  a 
passion  for  mischief,  a  delight  in  wrongdoing;  not  for  the  sake 
of  any  advantage  that  may  be  gained  by  it,  but  from  a  motive 
which  to  me  is  inexplicable.  I  have  seen  persons  who  seemed 
to  take  I  know  not  what  delight  in  tormenting  little  animals, 
so  far  below  them  in  the  scale  oi  being  as  to  place  them  in  a 
region  where  the  human  sympathies  do  not  act  with  very  great 
force.  But  suppose  the  case  of  the  laborious  ox  patiently  toil- 
ing at  the  plough,  set  upon  by  dogs  urged  on  by  some  instigators, 
men  or  boys,  to  worry  him,  to  tear  his  sides,  to  fix  their  fangs 
in  his  nostrils,  exerting  all  their  force  to  bring  him  down,  w^> 


12 

at  the  same  time  the  owner,  indifferent  to  his  sufferings,  is 
goading  him  on  from  behind — could  you  account  tor  the  behavior 
of  such  wretches  on  any  known  principles  of  human  nature? 
They  do  it  for  sport,  they  say.  Hard  as  that  js  to  believe,  we 
must  believe  it ;  since  there  is  no  other  imaginable  motive  for 
such  conduct.  And  if  this  be  so,  then  there  is  such  a  thing  as 
wanton  mischief — gratuitous  wickedness — injustice  done  for 
the  love  of  the  thing.  But,  if,  instead  pf  the  ox  in  this 
picture,  we  suppose  human  beings,  men  and  women,  especially 
women — -are  there  in  human  shape  beings  who  could  be  guilty 
of  such  cruelty  and  injustice  ! 

Now,  what  I  have  principally  in  view  in  these  remarks,  is  to 
show  that,  in  all  that  large  and  multifarious  class  of  cases  in 
which  liberty  of  action  is  carried  beyond  the  limits  of  justice 
by  a  criminal  invasion  of  the  rights  of  others,  to  which  class 
belong  the  instances  I  have  adduced,  and,  for  brevity's  sake, 
represented  in  figure,  the  offender  is  to  be  judged  on  other  prin- 
ciples than  those  which  belong  to  commutative  justice.  And 
when  we  transfer  the  maxims  which  obtain  in  cases  coming  un- 
cjer  the  hea4  of  commutative  justice  to  cases  which  belong  to 
that  species  of  justice  which  we  are  now  considering,  we  intro- 
duce confusion  into  our  ideas;  and  are  in  danger  also  of 
introducing  immorality  into  our  conduct.  If  it  is  a  crime  in 
me  to  shoot  at  you  with  an  intent  to  kill,  how  does  it  mend  the 
matter,  I  would  ask,  if  from  the  sphere  of  commutative  justice 
I  introduce  into  the  case  the  principle  of  reciprocity,  and  allow 
you  at  the  same  time  to  shoot  at  me  with  the  intent  to  kill  ? 

If  a  man  does  me  a  wrong  to  a  certain  amount,  and  I  injure 
him  as  much  in  return,  does  the  reciprocity  do  away  the  injus- 
tice, the  acts  destroying  each  other,  like  opposite  signs  in 
Algebra,  or  equal  weights  in  opposite  scales?  Or,  are  there 
not  rather  two  acts  of  injustice  in  the  case,  each  of  which  is  to 
be  estimated  by  itself?  No  one,  I  suppose,  would  contend  that  if 
a  man  propagates  a  lie  to  my  injury,  I  would  be  doing  justly  to 
propagate  another  lie  which  should  do  him  an  injury  to  the  same 
amount.  If  an  angry  man  strikes  me  a  blow,  does  that  give 
rne  the  right  to  give  back  the  btow  with  equal  force?  Not, 


13 

unless,  by  so  doing,  I  could  save  myself  the  infliction  of  another 
blow;  which  is  a  consideration  of  expediency,  not  of  justice. 

In  short,  the  whole  doctrine  of  retaliation,  which  was  almost 
universally  received  and  practiced  in  the  world  before  the  Ad- 
vent of  Christ,  could  hardly  have  been  sanctioned  by  the 
gravest  philosophers,  both  of  ancient  and  modern  times,  had 
they  not  confounded  together  these  two  kinds  of  justice,  which 
it  is  the  object  of  these  remarks  to  distinguish.  In  the  one,  a 
perfect  reciprocity  is  the  rule  of  justice;  in  the  other  it  is  not. 
The  one  concerns  the  rights  of  property.  The  other,  personal 
rights.  Violations  of  the  one  may  produce  no  pain.  Violations 
of  the  other  do  inflict  pain  and  suffering.  Acts  of  injustice  in 
cases  of  the  one  sort,  may  proceed  from  ignorance.  The  cases 
which  fall  under  the  other,  proceed  from  some  malignant  pas- 
sion, such  as  envy,  or  revenge,  jealousy,  or  suspicion ;  or  from 
some  exorbitant  desire,  such  as  ambition,  or  avarice ;  or  from 
some  corrupt  moral  principle,  such  as  fanaticism,  or  atheism. 
The  one  commands ;  the  the  other  prohibits.  The  one  has  for 
its  basis  the  laws  of  trade  and  the  frame  of  society,  both  of 
which  are  founded  on  exediency.  The1  other  is  nothing  else 
than  that  portion  of  the  unwritten  eternal  law  of  right,  wliidi 
bounds  the  freedom  of  human  action  by  the  obligation  to  re- 
spect the  rights  of  others.  Injuries  against  the  one  may  be 
valued  in  money :  those  against  the  other,  money  does  not 
measure. :  It  may,  therefore,  be  called  inhibitory  justice.  In 
your  law  books  the  one  is  called  civil,  the  other  criminal. 

There  is  another  species  of  justice,  which  deserves  to  be  men- 
tioned by  itself,  (for  to  mention  it  is  all  that  I  can  now  do*) 
because  it  does  not,  like  commutative  justice,  suppose  the  ex- 
change of  one  thing  for  another,  nor  are  its  requisitions  fulfilled 
by  merely'abstaining  from  injury,  as  is  the  case  with  those  r/ 
inhibitory  justice.  It  is  this  species  of  justice  by  which  parents 
are  bound  to  take  care  of  their  children.  The  children  do 
nothing  to  bring  the  parents  under  obligations  to  them.  The 
obligations  begin  with  the  existence  of  the  children,  an^  cease 
not  till  the  children  are  able  to  take  care  of  themselves. 

This  may  be   called  natural  justice.      In  the  phtfosophy  of 


14 

Greece  and  Rome  its  claims  were  extended  so  as  to  include  ail 
which  in  modern  systems  come  under  the  head  of  imperfect 
rights,  and  which  we  refer,  not  to  justice,  but  to  benevolence 
and  mercy.  Under  the  head  of  justice,  they  comprehended  all 
the  duties  that  man  owes  to  his  fellow  man.  Benevolence  was 
not  reckoned  among  the  cardinal  virtues  ;  not  because,  as  som.e 
have  supposed,  they  took  no  account  of  it,  but  because  they 
included  it  under  the  head  of  justice. 

The  only  other  species  of  justice  which  remains  to  be  noticed, 
is  what  may  be  denominated  rectoral  justice.  It  is  that  which 
belongs  to  government,  One  way  of  considering  it,  is  to  regard 
it  as  belonging,  originally,  and  exclusively,  and  inalienably,  to 
the  Supreme  Ruler  of  the  universe,  and  as  being  derived  from 
Him  to  "the  powers  that  be"  on  earth,  to  whom  he  has  been 
pleased  to  delegate  such  portion  of  it  as  is  necessary  for  the 
management  of  the  affairs  belonging  to  their  office.  The  other 
way  of  considering  it,  is  as  originating  with  the  people,  hy 
whom  such  portion  of  it  is  committed  to  their  representatives 
as  may  be  necessary  for  the  purposes  of  carrying  into  effect  the 
will  of  the  people. 

Whether  either,  or  neither  of  these  theories  be  the  true  one, 
or  whether  both  may  not  contain  a  mixture  of  truth  and  error, 
it  would  be  foreign  from  the  purpose  now  to  enquire. 

Whatever  theory  of  government  men  may  choose,  all  I  sup- 
pose, would  agree  in  this,  that  every  government  must  have  the 
power  to  reward  and  to  punish.  All,  it  is  likely,  would  agree, 
further,  that,  in  rewarding  and  punishing,  every  government 
ought  to  regard  justice  as  the  measure. 

But  in  going  further  than  these  two  points,  we  meet,  with  a 
great  diversity  in  men's  opinions,  which,  I  am  inclined  to  think, 
ift  made  to  seem  still  greater  by  their  different  ways  of  express- 
ing their  opinions  in  words  and  actions. 

I*  these  cases,  also,  as  in  many  others,  it  sometimes  happens 
that  tfie  opinions  which  people  express  in  words,  in  actions 
they  deny. 

As  to  \hat  part  of  justice  which  -consists  in  rewarding,  gov- 
ernments have  differed  exceedingly. 


15 

The  ancient  Athenians,  instead  of  rewarding  their  most  dis- 
tinguished citizens,  banished  them;  The  ostracism,  by  which 
they  drove  from  among  them  some  who  had  performed  the 
most  illustrious  services  for  the  state,  can  only  be  accounted  for 
by  referring  it  to  the  extreme  jealousy  with  which  they  guarded 
their  liberties.  To  punish  a  man,  not  for  any  thing  actually 
done  by  him,  or  even  intended  to  be  done,  but  for  something 
whieh  possibly  he  may  do  hereafter,  is  so  flagrant  a  violation 
of  every  principle  of  justice,  that  we  can  have  no  very  exalted 
opinion  of  the  moral  virtue  of  the  people  who  could  admit  it 
into  their  policy. 

The  government  of  Great  Britain  presents  an  example  of 
what,  according  to  the  notions  commonly  received  among  us, 
seems  to  carry  the  rewarding  power  into  the  opposite  extreme, 
remunerating  services  done  to  the  state  by  high  offices,  honors 
and  emoluments,  descending  to  the  posterity  of  the  hero,  or  the 
man  of  science,  by  whom  they  are  rendered.  A  small  state 
surrounded  by  enemies,  must  stimulate  her  citizejrs  by  high  re- 
wards, to  excite  them  to  deeds  of  high  achievement.  And,  if 
ever  the  time  shall  come  when  the  spirit  of  discord,  rending 
assunder  the  bands  which  now  unite  these  States,  shall  put 
them,  in  regard  to  each  other,  in  relations  similar  to  those  which 
obtained  in  that  condition  of  things  in  which  the  government  of 
Great  Britain  and  the  other  governments  of  Europe  had  their 
'origin,  that  same  policy  will  of  necessity  be  resorted  toon  this 
side  the  Alantic. 

When  the  merit  of  the  citizen  consists  simply  in  not  trans- 
gressing the  laws,  his  country  rewards  him  sufficiently  in  simply 
not  punishing  him.  His  obedience  is  negative,  and  so  is  his 
recompense.  "Non  hominem  occidi."  "Non  pasces  in  cruce 
corvos."— HORACE,  EPIST.  xvi. 

As  to  punishments,  the  nature  of  that  justice  by  which  they 
are  inflicted  and  the  ends  at  which  it  aims,  determine  their 
character. 

Punishments  are  disciplinary,  when  they  are  inflicted  with 
the  view  of  working  a  reformation  on  the  offender  ;  exemplary, 
when  the  intention  is  to  deter  others  from  following  his 


16 

example  ;  condign,  when  the  punishment  is  iri  proportion  to  the 
atrocity  of  his  offence ;  and  vindicatory,  when  this  proportion 
is  maintained  by  the  inflicting  upon  him  an  amount  of  suffering 
adequate  to  the  moral  turpitude  of  the  offence; 

In  disciplinary  and  exemplary  punishments,  justice  is  no 
further  concerned  than  in  guarding  the  culprit  against  too  heavy 
infliction.  If  it  falls  short  of  the  proper  measure,  that  is  not  a 
matter  for  justice  to  settle,  or  to  care  about,  but  expediency. 
But,  in  condign  punishment,  justice  is  concerned  that  the  pun- 
ishment be  not  less  than  the  offence,  as  well  as  that  it  be  not 
greater. 

But  when  we  speak  of  less  or  greater  in  this  case,  the  refer- 
ence  is  to  that  in  the  crime  which  I  have  called  its  atrocity,  by 
which  I  mean  that  in  the  character  of  a  crime  by  which  it  pro- 
duces injury,  pain,  grief,  disturbance  to  man.  To  this,  which  is 
a  moral  estimation  of  a  crime  from  its  effects^  legislators  very 
properly  add  other  considerations  drawn  from  expediency,  such 
as  the  facility  with  which  the  crime  may  be  committed,  and  the 
danger  of  its  becoming  prevalent,  proportioning  the  punishment 
to  these.  But,  in  vindicatory  punishment,  justice  looks  into  the 
heart  of  the  offender,  and,  on  discerning  the  amount  of  moral 
turpitude  there,  so  far  forth  as  that  turpitude  has  gone  out  and 
exerted  itself  in  action,  measures  out  to  him  an  answerable 
amount  of  punishment,  that  is,  pain  which  shall  be  equal,  in 
intensity  and  duration,  to  the  moral  turpitude, 

The  human  judge  sees  only  the  atrocity,  the  outward  visage 
of  the  crime,  and  conjectures  its  turpitude,  its  inward  character, 
from  that.  The  atrocity  is  that  alone  which  human  justice  can 
reach.  The  turpitude,  it  is  true,  is  in  most  cases  equal  to  the 
atrocity;  not  always.  A  hideous  face  is  sometimes  seen  on  a 
person  who  is  found,  on  closer  acquaintance,  not  to  be  what  he 
seems,  "a  cannibal  savage :"  and  a  plausible  face  often  hides  a 
black  heart.  And  it  is  somewhat  so  in  actions.  The  omniscient 
God  alone,  who  cannot  be  imposed  upon  by  false  testimony,  or 
false  appearance,  is  competent  to  the  task  of  inflicting  vindica- 
tory punishment. 

If  it  is  asked  whether  justice  requires  Him  to  inflict  it  in  al! 


cases,  I  promptly  answer,  no.  Reason  could  not,  perhaps,  de- 
cide the  point;  but  the  Gospel  decides  it  in  favor  of  the  offender, 
who  repe-nts  and  truly  believes  that  holy  Gospel.  But  if  he 
should  not  repent?  Ask  me  not  what  then  !  From  no  quarter 
of  the  sky,  from  no  point  of  the  compass  on  earth,  from  no 
intimation  of  the  conscious  spirit  within,  can  an  omen  be  drawn 
in  favor  of  his  prospects  who  is  unjust. 

The  rectoral  justice  of  the  Most  High  may  not  require  Him 
to  punish  moral  turpitude  for  its  own  sake;  since  in  that  case 
He  must  punish  it  wherever  it  is  found ;  so  that  there  would  be 
noplace  for  pardon  to  the  penitent;  and  yet  the  laws  of  his 
moral  government  may^be  such  as  that  misery  may  flow  from 
an  infraction  of  them  in  a  natural  way,  as  we  see  it  does  in  the 
case  of  physical  laws- — not  immediately,  for  that  would  be  to 
change  the  condition  of  human  life  from  a  state  of  probation 
into  a  state  of  retribution,  but  in  some  distant  period  in  the 
existence  of  the  transgressor. 

In  opposition  to  this  reasoning  I  am  aware  that  it  will  be  al- 
ledged,  that  the  doctrine  of  atonement,  which  lies  at  the  found- 
ation of  the  Christian's  Creed,  is  constructed  on  the  necessity, 
that  God  should  punish  moral  turpitude  on  its  own  account,  and 
in  all  cases,  and  that  we,  as  transgressors,  can  look  for  pardon 
only  on  the  ground  that  our  moral  turpitude  has  been  imputed 
to  another,  our  blessed  Savior,  and  punished  in  him.*  To  which 
I  reply  that  moral  turpitude  inheres  in  the  person  and  cannot 
be  transferred  by  imputation,  or  in  any  other  way ;  and  that,  as 
moral  turpitude  is  the  ground  of  punishment,  the  Savior  was 
not  punished,  and  could  not  in  justice  be  punished  for  trans- 
gression,  since  he  was  innocent.  Punishment  is  a  correlative 
term,  and  refers  to  moral  turpitude.  Each  supposes  each :  as 
a  ruler  supposes  a  subject ;  and  a  subject,  a  ruler.  The  inno- 
cent may  be  made  to  suffer  for  the  guilty;  but  not  punished, 
But  here  again  it  is  assumed  that  for  the  innocent,  to  suffer  sup- 
poses guilt  under  the  just  government  of  God,  and  accordingly 

•The  principle  of  zacrijicial  substitution,  on  which  the  scriptural    doctrine 
of  atonement  is  ba*er),  frees  that  doctrine'  from  the  absurd  canfequences  w/th 
the  theory  of  a  moral  wib«,titulion  is  embarrassed. 


18 

we  are  told  that  the  sufferings  of  infants  prove  that  they  are 
guilty.  Original  sin  I  do  not  deny;  but  this  assumption  I  am 
constrained  to  deny.  The  justice  of  God  does  not  require  that 
He  exempt  the  innocent  from  suffering.  It  only  requires  that 
He  make  existence  in  some  degree  a  blessing.  Now,  if  to  one 
of  his  creatures  He  gives  two  degrees  of  enjoyment,  filling  up 
to  the  full  its  two  capacities ;  and  to  another  gives  ten  capaci- 
ties, filling  six  of  them  with  enjoyment,  while  four  are  full  of 
pain :  these  two  creatures  are  equal  in  point  of  happiness, 
though  the  one  is  exempted  from  suffering  and  the  other  not. 
The  doctrine  of  atonement  does  not  require  in  its  vindication 
that  the  teachings  of  natural  religion  should  be  contradicted. 
"Shall  not  the  Judge  of  all  the  earth  do  right  ?" 

These  distinctions  of  justice  into  commutative,  inhibitory, 
natural  and  rectoral,  are  not,  it  appears  to  me,  distinctions  with- 
out a  difference.  Nor  are  they  useless.  No  little  mischief  is 
done  by  confounding  them  ;  as  did  time  permit,  might  be  easily 
shown.  Take  the  maxim,  for  instance,  "Volenti  non  fit  inju-< 
ria" — that  is,  injustice  is  not  done  to  one  who  consents — and 
you  will  find  that  it  applies  only  to  cases  in  which  commutative 
justice  is  concerned,  but  not  at  all  to  cases  coming  under  any 
of  the  other  sorts  of  justice  which  have  been  specified.  If  ap- 
plied to  cases  of  inhibitory  justice,  it  is  in  fact  a  most  false  and 
pernicious  maxim,  and  justifies  the  conduct  of  those,  who,  for 
sake  of  dishonest  gain,  furnish  the  intoxicating  cup  to  such  as 
are  willing  to  receive  it,  and  that  whole  tribe  of  unjust  persons, 
the  very  pests  and  plague  of  society,  who  allure  to  certain  ruin 
all  such  simple  ones  as  by  their  plausible  arts  they  can  capti- 
vate. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  must  be  observed  that  the  distinctions 
which  have  been  pointed  out,  do  not  cut  the  great  sphere  of 
justice  by  a  sheer  division  into  separate  sections,  so  that  noth- 
ing shall  appear  in  any  two  of  them  which  belongs  to  the  same 
act.  Such  divisions  can  rarely  be  made  in  moral  subjects. — 
For  example,  it  was  remarked  under  the  head  of  commutative 
justice,  that  if  I  gave  to  a  man  a  day's  work,  relying  on  his 
promise  to  give  me  a  day's  work  in  return,  and  he  should  not 


19 

do  it,  I  would  be  injured  in  property  to  that  amount,  but  that 
there  would  be  in  the  case  an  injury  of  another  kind,  which 
would  come  under  our  notice  in  its  proper  connexion  :  and  that 
is  here.  The  injury  consists  in  the  pain  I  should  be  compelled 
to  feel  in  looking  at  the  falseness  of  the  man,  brought  home  to 
me  and  thrust  upon  my  attention  in  a  way  which  should  force 
me  to  look  at  it  for  a  time.  There  is  in  it  also  a  violation  of 
natural  justice  and  the  divine  law. 

Will  you,  young  gentlemen,  allow  me  in  concluding  these 
my  remarks,  to  say  to  you  ^plainly  that  the  profession  of  the 
law  which  you  have  chosen,  though  necessary  and  honorable, 
will  expose  you  to  temptations,  from  which  nothing  can  so  well 
preserve  you  as  that  living  sense  of  justice  in  the  heart,  which 
is  the  foundation  of  whatever  is  estimable  in  the  character  of 
a  virtuous  man.  Plato,  in  his  ''Republic,"  has  some  noble  as 
well  as  some  curious  thoughts  on  this  point,  which,  did  time 
permit,  I  should  like  to  present  to  you.  He  begins  his  specula* 
tions  by  inspecting  the  human  constitution,  to  see  if  he  can 
discover  in  it  what  justice  is,  but  he  finds  himself  at  a  loss,  as  a 
person  would  be  who  should  try  to  read  a  piece  of  writing  in 
which  the  letters  are  so  very  small  as  not  to  be  easily  traced 
by  the  sharpest  eye,  and  throwing  it  away,  turns  to  another 
piece  of  writing  in  which  the  words  and  letters  are  the  same 
as  jn  the  first,  but  large  and  full.  This  is  his  "Commonwealth," 
the  constitution  of  which  is  the  exact  counterpart  of  that  which 
nature  has  established  in  the  individual  man. 

In  the  first  part  of  his  subject  he  recites  the  legend  of  the 
shepherd  Gyges,  which  Cicero  quotes  somewhere  in  his  "Offi- 
ces." The  legend  is  briefly  this :  "Gyges  goes  down  into  a 
chasm  which  an  earthquake  had  opened  far  under  ground,  at 
the  bottom  of  which  he  finds  a  dead  body  of  a  man,  and  on 
one  of  his  fingers  a  brilliant  ring,  This  he  pulls  off  and  puts 
it  on  his  own  finger.  On  coming  out  again  and  joining  the 
company  of  his  fellow-shepherds,  he  finds  that,  upon  turning 
inwards  the  signet  of  the  ring,  "he  becomes  invisible.  Availing 
himself  of  this  new  power,  he  makes  his  way  to  the  throne  of 
the  kingdom  by  debauching  the  queen  and  murdering  the  king/* 


20 

The  moral  of  the  legend  is  this,  that  no  man  is  just  who  would, 
were  he  the  owner  of  such  a  ring,  do  an  unjust  action.  Plato, 
however,  goes  further,  and  supposes  the  world  to  be  such,  that, 
by  practising  injustice,  a  man  should  infallibly  gain  all  advan- 
tages, wealth  and  power,  and  honor,  and  the  reputation  of  being 
just,  not  only  among  men,  but  with  the  gods  themselves, 
whom  he  supposes  to  be  gained  over  to  favor  this  unjust  man 
by  his  show  of  piety ;  so  that  he  is,  by  the  gifts  of  fortune  and 
the  favor  of  men  and  the  gods,  put  into  possession  of  the  great- 
est happiness  here  and  hereafter  ;  and  all  this,  as  the  fruits  of 
injustice :  while,  on  the  contrary,  the  just  man  has  to  encounter 
the  opposite  of  all  these  good  things,  and  in  addition  to  all  his 
sufferings,  the  hatred  of  men  and  of  the  gods.  After  stating 
such  an  hypothesis,  which,  as  you  see,  leaves  to  the  just  man 
no  other  motive  to  the  practice  of  justice  but  the  love  of  justice 
itself,  while  all  conceivable  inducements  are  cast  in  the  oppo- 
site scale,  Plato  was  evidently  on  the  point  of  pronouncing  the 
same  decision  as  before  on  the  hypothesis  of  the  ring.  But  he 
disappoints  his  reader,  and  starts  back  at  the  sight  of  what  his 
imagination  had  raised,  not  finding  it  in  his  heart  to  subject  his 
just  man  to  so  severe  a  test.  He  shrinks  aghast  from  the  mon- 
ster of  his  own  fancy's  creation,  and  covers  his  retreat  by  al- 
Jedging,  as  I  have  before  stated,  that,  in  the  tablet  he  is  attempt- 
ing to  read,  the  letters  are  too  minute  and  the  strokes  too  fine 
to  impress  themselves  distinctly  upon  his  vision. 

Young  gentlemen,  I  will  not  urge  upon  you  so  hard  an  hy- 
pothesis as  this  of  Plato.  I  will  only  suppose  justice,  and 
weakness,  and  no  fee  on  the  one  side — and,  if  you  please,  pop- 
ular odium  on  the  same  side : — and  on  the  other,  popular  favor, 
applause  and  a  rich  fee : — such  is  often  the  problem  which  prac- 
tically meets  us,  poor  mortals.  Happy  he  who  in  looking  back 
over  his  course  through  life,  can  point  to  decision  after  decision 
passed  in  the  council  chamber  of  the  heart  in  favor  of  justice, 
while  interest  plead,  pleasure  solicited,  and  fear  threatened,  on 
the  opposite  side :  still  more  happy,  if  no  decision  whatever,  in 
matters  of  moment,  can  be  found  possessing  the  contrary  char- 
acter j  righteousness  within,  which  is  subjective  justice,  reigninrr 


31 

victorious  iu  all  the  struggles  appointed  for  the  exercise  and 
trial  of  his  virtue  on  the  theatre  of  life.  And  here  we  see  the 
connexion  between  morals  and  religion.  For  human  virtue 
being  alone  cannot  sustain  itself;  but  must  call  to  its  aid  faith,  an 
auxiliary  from  heaven;  and  hope  and  fear,  the  children  of  faith. 

In  concluding  this  discourse  on  the  nature  of  justice,  a  sense 
of  justice  to  you,  young  gentlemen,  constrains  me  to  say,  that 
your  close  application  to  study  and  your  correct  and  gentlemanly 
deportment,  which  has  frequently  been  the  subject  of  remark 
privately  among  the  members  of  the  Faculty,  and  which  de- 
mands this  more  public  commendation,  encourages  the  expec- 
tation that  your  influence  hereafter,  in  your  professional  course, 
will  be  such  as  to  promote  the  best  interests,  not  only  of  those 
portions  of  the  community  where  you  may  respectively  reside, 
but  of  this  commonwealth  and  the  nation  at  large. 

Let  not  this  expectation  be  disappointed.  And  remember 
that  to  this  end  it  will  be  necessary  for  you  to  devote  your  wKole 
care  and  study  to  improve  yourselves  in  every  attribute  which 
belongs  to  the  character  of  a  good  man  and  a  good  lawyer. 

Let  no  low  dishonorable  practice  of  the  pettifogger,  seeking 
to  promote  litigation  that  he  may  procure  a  fee;  no  dishonest 
arts  of  the  demagogue,  flattering  the  people  that  he  may  rise 
into  office  by  their  votes;  no  indecencies  or  licentiousness  of  the 
tongue  ever  disgrace  your  professional  course.  Be  not  wanting 
in  fidelity  and  zeal  in  the  cause  of  your  client,  but  let  not  your 
zeal  transport  you  beyond  the  bounds  of  truth,  justice  or  de- 
corum. And  let  no  irregularities  in  your  habits  of  private  life, 
draw  off  your  mind  from  those  pursuits  of  knowledge  and  virr 
tue  which  will  dignify  and  adorn  your  profession,  and  extend 
your  sphere  of  usefulness  in  the  world.  Above  all,  cherish  in 
your  hearts  reverence  for  the  Almighty  Ruler  of  the  universe, 
with  whom  perfect  justice  dwells,  and  let  no  false  shame,  nor 
fear  of  the  sneers  of  the  infidel,  nor  press  of  business,  prevent 
you  from  studying  His  Book  of  laws  and  observing  them  in  prac- 
tice, remembering  that  a  sense  of  duty  to  Him  is  the  best 
preservative  of  justice,  and  the  firmest  ba^is  of  good  order 
amons;  men. 


Hssibsnt 

Frederick  T.  Brown,  Spencer, 

Thomas  H.  Brunner,  Princeton, 

Morton  C.  Hunter,  Bloomington, 


Senior    Class. 


STUDENTS 

Of    the   LAW    DEPARTMENT  of    the  INDIANA   UUNIVERSITY, 
Session  of  1849-50. 


INDIANA. 
*do 
<do 


INDIANA, 

do 

do 

ARKANSAS. 
INDIANA, 

do 

do 

OHIO. 
INDIANA. 

do 

do 

do 


INDIANA. 

do 

IRELAND. 
INDIANA. 

do 

do 

D.  C. 
INDIANA. 
MARYLAND. 
INDIANA. 

do 
*Io 

do 

— Total,  28, 


William  A.  Bugh, 
George  A.  Buskirk, 
Ambrose  B.  Carlton, 
Aden  G.  Gavins, 
Richard  A.  Clements, 
Isaac  W.  Love, 
Robert  H.  Milroy, 
Sheridan  P.  Read, 
Robert  A.  Smith, 
Alfred  Wheeler, 
Elias  Willits, 
Simeon  K.  Wolfe, 


Decatur, 

Bloomington, 

Bedford, 

Helena, 

Washington, 

Cory don, 

Delphi, 

Urbana, 

Booneville, 

Bedford, 

Centreville, 

Corydon, 


Jnnior 


Edward  B.  Allen, 
Thomas  Bigham,' 
Michael  F.  Bourke, 
Marmion  H.  Bowers, 
William  Brown, 
James  C.  Faris, 
Alexander  M.  Haskell, 
William  S.  Hillyer, 
George  A.  Johnson, 
John  Lopp, 
Blackford  B.  Moffatt, 
Eliphalet  D.  Pearson, 
James  Woodward, 

Resident  Graduates,  3; 


Terre  Haute, 

Bloomington,, 

Dublin, 

Moore's  Hill, 

Kokomo, 

Rensaeller, 

Washington, 

New  Albany, 

Salisbury, 

Corydon, 

Te^re  Haute, 

Spfmgville, 

Hloomington, 

Seniors, '12;  Juniors,  13 


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